Authorities in New Mexico will not seek charges against three police officers involved in a fatal shooting after arriving at the wrong house last year.
Officers in the town of Farmington fired dozens of shots and killed Robert Dotson, 52, because he appeared at the door of his home holding a gun.
At the time, the officers were responding to a domestic violence call from a house across the street.
The Dotson family filed a lawsuit against the department last year.
According to a complaint filed by the family in court, police arrived at the Dotson residence late on 5 April, 2023 and “parked down the street and did not have their lights on”.
When Mr Dotson opened his front door holding a weapon, police immediately opened fire, striking him 12 times. Another 19 shots were fired at his wife Kimberly, who was unharmed during the incident. Police later said she opened fire on officers with a pistol.
UK leading by example then. But riddle me this, how often is a firearm needed for an officer doing their everyday duties? Traffic stops, patrols, responding to calls. How often is it explicitly needed to be actively carrying a loaded firearm to a inherently non violent situation before having assessed it? I honestly have no idea. Is the expectation in the US that you’ll just get straight up murdered for doing your job? Is that how you guys live?
That’s the gist of what they’re taught, yeah. It shouldn’t take much digging to find “training” videos that are essentially: cop walks up to man in parking lot, man pulls a knife and lunges at cop instantly. The moral? Everyone is ready to kill you.
How often do you need your seatbelt? Should you still wear it anyway? And there are situations when wearing a seatbelt can kill you where you would survive without it.
The idea is the same with cops. A properly trained cop carying a weapon all the time would be safer overall by being able to react to violent situations while not posing a threat in non-violent ones. The issue is how incredibly undertrained most US cops are.
And yes, if they are not sufficiently trained, they should not carry a gun period. Not in their car, not anywhere.